A FORMER editor of The Brecon & Radnor Express has written a novel which he is now self-publishing on Amazon.

Patrick Edwards says it took just eight days to write his book Playing Away after he resigned as the B&R editor in July this year.

The book is about a football agent, Paul Gently, who is faced with a dilemma while handling the careers of two of English football’s hottest prospects. One player, Ralph Conran, is about to have his big sex secret revealed by a Sunday newspaper. Paul has to decide whether or not to reveal an even bigger story about his other star, Leroy Johnson, to save Ralph’s career.

The idea for the novel came to Patrick while he was out riding his bike in the Brecon Beacons and from there it “almost wrote itself”.

He said: “From the moment I had the idea to typing the final sentence took just over a week. For those eight days I simply ate and slept, otherwise I was at my laptop hammering at the keys, it was as if the book wrote itself. When I’d finished I found I’d written 50,000 words.”

Patrick, who still lives in Brecon and has worked in newspaper for more than 30 years, said it had always been his ambition to write a book.

The 54-year-old said: ‘I think it’s every journalist’s ambition to write a novel. When you’re working as a full-time journalist it’s hard to find the motivation and time to write a book, but after I left the B&R over the summer I found I had that time available.”

He said the book is “not highbrow at all” and turned out to be “much racier” than intended.

“I wanted to write something that might be successful commercially. I wouldn’t say it’s deliberately trashy but it is meant to appeal to a wide readership. There’s much more sex in it than I expected and it hinges on a social dilemma that speaks volumes about the modern era, especially in sport.”

Patrick said he had to write the book quickly because one of its central themes about a top-flight English footballer coming out as gay could be overtaken by events.

With Gareth Thomas coming out shortly before his retirement from rugby and gay stars flourishing in other sports, Patrick believes the arrival of the first openly gay high-profile footballer could be any day now.

“It’s only a matter of time before the Premier League has its first openly gay player. This was a subject I wanted to explore and I didn’t want to turn on the TV and find I’d been beaten to the punch.”

However dad-of-two Patrick said the book is “not gay porn or gay fiction”.

“I would describe it as adult fiction set in a sporting context. There is plenty of sex in it but there’s much more in it than that. If anything it’s a book about modern relationships.”

He said he tried in vain over the summer to find a publisher for his book and then “gave up” and decided to publish it himself using the tools available on Amazon’s book and kindle services.

The book is available for a limited period as a free e-book through Amazon UK’s Kindle Unlimited service, and as an ebook and a paperback on Amazon Books.

The ebook version costs £3.10 and the printed book, which runs to 138 pages, costs £4.85.